Antiques Roadshow

GUEST: I brought in a ring that I found at an estate sale a couple of months ago.

It was a dark room, it was a junk jewelry bin, and it had a five-dollar price tag.

And I just thought it was cool, so I picked it up.

When I got to better lighting, I saw little markings.

So I investigated a little bit further, and it kind of piqued my interest even more from what I saw.

APPRAISER: What'd you see?

GUEST: The 18 karats was what I saw first.

And then I saw the Cartier name.

APPRAISER: Ah.

GUEST: And then also another name which seemed Vietnamese.

APPRAISER: Yeah.

GUEST: I looked it up a little bit, and it seems like they were a designer for Cartier for a certain time.

APPRAISER: Well, you're absolutely correct.

It is by a designer named Dinh Van, who worked for Cartier in the 1950s.

And he opened his own shop in 1965.

And he made very unusual rings, especially for a traditional jeweler like Cartier.

Just some funky shapes.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: Now, you also told me something special about this ring.

GUEST: That it comes apart--it comes into two pieces.

Yep!

APPRAISER: That's amazing.

(laughs) That is so great.

I loved it, and...

GUEST: I'm glad you think it's as cool as I do!

(laughs) APPRAISER: 'Cause it's three rings in one.

GUEST: Yeah.

APPRAISER: We have the 18-karat white gold portion of the ring on top and the 18-karat yellow gold on the bottom.

On the yellow gold ring, it is stamped on the side "Cartier 18k Dinh Van."

My guess would be that these are from the late '50s, maybe early '60s.

I was looking up for similar rings from Dinh Van for Cartier, and I found other rings like this, but not the exact same thing.

And those were selling, at retail, for $6,000 to $8,000.

GUEST: Oh, wow.

APPRAISER: I would definitely put that ring in with that group, because it is so unique and so different.

That's quite the five-dollar find!

GUEST: (laughs): Yeah, you can't beat that.

That's pretty good return.

APPRAISER: I'd never seen anything like that, that unscrews, and I've seen quite a few bits of jewelry in my day.

GUEST: Oh, that's so cool-- that's cool to know.